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When I’m playing the Trine [official site] games I feel like I’m shuffling around inside beautiful fantasy concept art. It’s a little known fact that Louis Armstrong’s recording of What A Wonderful World was performed after an all-night cooperative Trine binge and the inspiration is clear (the final verse, however, was a joke about The […]

If someone could kindly make a Trine 2 level that’s a big huge grappling hook playground with daring leaps and grand fairytale vistas, I’d be much obliged. Developers Frozenbyte have released public beta versions of the level editors for both its magical puzzle-platformers, you see, but I’m oh so horribly busy this week. They let […]

Each generation adds its own twist to old fairytales, reflecting the tone and fashions of the era, teasing out undertones as statements. Trine was not an adaptation of an old tale, but played with genre conventions to deliver a modern message: lusty wizards and thieves with grappling hooks are totally wicked cool. But what comes […]

I remember Trine as being awfully pretty but no, apparently it wasn’t pretty enough for developers Frozenbyte (and, having now returned to the game, it seems my memory’s not quite what it was). They’re porting Trine over to the Trine 2 engine, giving the puzzle-platformer a fairytale makeover and its sequel’s online co-op. While Frozenbyte […]

It’s easy to forget what reality is and how to breathe and why basic human values matter during E3 week. It’s also easy to forget that there are other things going on in gaming’s humongous land. Inventive projects on Kickstarter, for instance. A post-apocalyptic survival game that’s genuinely about survival, rather than shooting giant mutant […]

I’ve not had a chance to go back to Jason Rohrer’s fascinatingly bleak, tricksy home invasion MMOette The Castle Doctrine since launch, but it’s now on update 8 and has seen a number of changes. Most headline-making (as you can see) of those is the concept of perma-perma-death.

Huh, that was quick. Then again, everything I experienced of Jason Rohrer’s home invasion MMO-ette The Castle Doctrine last week did come across as essentially finished, so I suppose there’s no reason not to release it to the world now. The version the Passage dev has put out is billed as an ‘alpha’, in that […]

The Castle Doctrine, the upcoming game from Passage and Sleep Is Death creator Jason Rohrer, is an indie MMO about criminals invading your home, and you invading their homes. A combination of base-building and puzzle-solving, it’s also an examination of how it feels to be both victim and villain. I’ve spent some time with an […]

In the first part of an extensive, illuminating and arguably controversial interview with Passage, Sleep is Death and Chain World creator Jason Rohrer, we discussed his new game, the fascinating but sinister home defence MMO The Castle Doctrine, making virtual possessions and people matter and why he chose to include only male protagonists. In this […]

Indie dev Jason Rohrer, creator of Passage, Sleep Is Death, Inside A Star-Filled Sky, The Diamond Trust of London and the near-mythical Chain World is a divisive game designer, because reasons. I personally reckon his stuff is reliably fascinating, bold and often important (including on those occasions that I’ve rather bounced off it), so I’ve […]

About the easiest way to start a bar fight among those who deem themselves educated in videogames is to bring up Jason Rohrer’s Passage (missus), an unwitting poster child for ‘artgames.’ It worked its morose magic on me, while others found it arch and ungame, but between that and the lofty ambitions (though there are […]

I remember a review of Zhang Yimou’s Hero which claimed that almost any frame from the film would be worthy of hanging in a gallery. Hyperbolic perhaps but it was a motion picture not afraid to include all of the the colours, frequently in astonishing arrangements. Similarly rich in palette, Trine 2 brings a beauty […]